


Parting Gifts

by EllaStorm



Category: The Lord of the Rings (Movies), The Lord of the Rings - All Media Types, The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Boromir Lives, Confessions, Devotion, Difficult Decisions, Fix-It, Kissing, M/M, Oaths & Vows, Oral Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-16
Updated: 2020-11-16
Packaged: 2021-03-10 00:15:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27594674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EllaStorm/pseuds/EllaStorm
Summary: At the riverbank of the Anduin Boromir realises that the Ring has taken hold of him. He confesses to the man who would be his King and decides to do the right thing.
Relationships: Aragorn | Estel/Boromir (Son of Denethor II)
Comments: 8
Kudos: 120





	Parting Gifts

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to another Aramir Fix-It-Fic. I wrote this because I had a lot of emotions (will this happen every time I do a LotR rewatch from now on?). Boromir absolutely doesn’t die in this one and I feel better now.
> 
> Also, this is obviously Tolkien’s playground, and I’m once more offering my sincerest apologies to him – but digging around in his sandbox is just too much darn fun.

“I will not lead the Ring within a hundred leagues of your city.”

Aragorn’s eyes were blue and cold, forcing any retort Boromir might have given violently back down his throat. An icy fist took hold of his insides when Aragorn turned away from him, his steps falling over the gravel at the riverbank back towards the camp.

_Your city._

Boromir’s fist clenched at his side, unwittingly. Aragorn was so quick to push his own ancestry aside. But the longer Boromir had travelled with him the clearer it had become to him that not only did Gondor need a King, it needed _Aragorn_. His grace. His heart. His leadership. And still, for all the qualities of a King that Aragorn so obviously possessed, there seemed to be no will inside him to ascend the throne, to claim his heritage.

_He thinks men beneath him._

The thought intruded upon Boromir like it had been spoken _to_ him, not sprung from his own mind, and that observation frightened him into pausing to breathe for a moment.

_When did I become so quick to anger?_

Boromir forced himself to slow his breath, unclench his fingers, and his rage started to subside. A quick glance over to the encampment showed him that Sam and Frodo were sleeping a mere thirty feet away. Remorse flooded his stomach. He very much hoped they hadn’t witnessed the harsh words exchanged between Aragorn and him.

He shook his head in an attempt to clear it. Sometimes he didn’t recognise himself these days. Yes, surely it was frustrating to him that Aragorn dismissed his Kinghood so easily, that he had so little trust in men, that he seemed to see nothing but their shortcomings. But in other circumstances Boromir would have exacted much more patience with him, would have taken time to prove himself and _show_ Aragorn what honour and goodness lay in men instead of attempting to strong-arm him towards Minas Tirith with such aggression.

There was something else at play here, toying with his mind, wearing him thin, and despite not really wanting to acknowledge it, Boromir had a growing inkling to where his sudden irascibility might be coming from.

His eyes fell back on Frodo’s sleeping form and he remembered how natural, how soothing it had felt to hold the Ring in his hands, the sun and snow of Mount Caradhras reflecting in its perfect, golden form. How wrong it had seemed to give it back.

He had dreamed about the Ring often afterwards, had seen himself hand it over to his father, whose eyes shone brightly at the sight of it, suddenly free from all the darkness that had clouded them for the past years. In the dream Denethor sat at his table, Boromir and Faramir to both his sides, the three of them laughing and eating. Redeemed from all his worries now that Gondor was safe, now that Sauron’s reign would crumble to dust and the people would sleep well in their beds at night, he took Faramir’s and Boromir’s hands in his and smiled with overflowing joy – _this city will never fall, my sons._

After Lothlorien the dream had changed, however. Boromir was no longer handing the Ring to his father. Instead he saw Aragorn, sitting proud and high on the throne of Gondor, the crown of his fathers upon his head, his face still so familiar, his eyes still full of grace and love as he smiled down at Boromir before him on his knee, swearing fealty and allegiance to his King, the Ring a gleaming presence around Aragorn’s neck. _Stand, Boromir, Steward of Gondor._ And when Boromir did, the look in Aragorn’s eyes told him that no one deserved the power of the Ring as much as Aragorn, and no one would wield that power as wisely. That Gondor was saved through him.

Waking up from these wonderful dreams to cold mornings and finding the Ring just out of reach around the Ringbearer’s neck tended to put Boromir in a foul, irritated mood; and some part of him had grown uneasy at how often this was now occurring. Deep inside him, Boromir knew that the frequency of his dreaming wasn’t natural. His mind was occupied by the Ring far too often during the day already – and now not even the night was giving him respite.

_Something is very, very wrong with me._

The thought dripped into Boromir’s consciousness slowly, painfully, but it didn’t feel like it shouldn’t be there; on the contrary – it seemed to Boromir that he should have let it in much sooner, like a bitter medicine that he desperately needed to cure him of his sickness. He had been so _angry_ the past days, so impatient, so full of greed, his thoughts completely taken by the Ring, and the Ring alone, calling to him, seducing him.

One glance at Frodo and he could already feel it rising up inside him, that _draw,_ quickening his pulse and prompting his mind to wander to Gondor, to his city, to all the people there and the danger looming over them, and if he could only _have_ it, he would be able to save –

Boromir turned away. _No._

None of this was right. His gaze wandered over the river, quiet, dark waters, to the place where he had spotted the creature Gollum earlier.

 _This is what the Ring does._ _It will destroy me just as it destroyed this creature. If I have it, I will become but a shadow of myself._

He closed his eyes and thought of his brother. If Faramir had come here in his stead, he wouldn’t have let it get this far. For all that Denethor favoured his firstborn, Boromir knew better than anyone that his brother would have been far better suited for this task. He was considerate, calm, loyal, prudent, the opposite of impulsive – and he was not as afraid to fail Denethor as Boromir was. The Ring wouldn’t have gotten to him quite so quickly.

A dull ache settled in Boromir’s stomach when Aragorn’s words rang through his head again: _I will not lead the Ring within a hundred leagues of your city._

He was right. Though he was wrong about his Kingship, he was right about this. The Ring was more powerful than all of them, and more dangerous, too. It would thrust Gondor into darkness instead of raising it into the light, enslave its people and shatter the walls of Minas Tirith until there was nothing left of it but rubble and ghosts.

Boromir turned back to the camp, his eyes searching, his mind doing its best to shut the beckoning thrum of the Ring out. He saw the hobbits and Gimli asleep on the ground, while Legolas held watch further away, his head turned towards the forest, fair hair shimmering in the light from the dying fire. Though he must have heard him, he didn’t turn when Boromir closed in on him, carefully stepping around the hobbits and trying to keep the noise of his footfalls down, so as not to wake them.

“I need to talk to Aragorn,” he whispered, and the elf finally faced him. The look in his eyes was clear and direct, and Boromir realised that he must have witnessed his argument with Aragorn. However, his expression softened quickly, leaving Boromir to wonder whether the elf had seen something in his face that gave away the reason why he was in search of Aragorn’s company.

“He walks into the forest and finds a clearing to smoke a pipe in when he feels the need to sort his thoughts. As far as I can tell he moved straight ahead, then ever so slightly southward, before I lost him from my earshot.”

Boromir nodded. “Thank you.”

“No need,” Legolas said. The tiniest of smiles seemed to play around his lips, before his features settled into their usual impassivity again, and his eyes turned back to the forest.

Boromir walked straight ahead into the undergrowth, as Legolas had told him to, and soon enough the light of the fire was fading behind him and he needed to take care not to stumble over his feet in the sparse rays of moonlight the leafage over his head let through. The fallen autumn leaves were cracking and breaking under his feet, and he’d just started wondering how on earth he was going to find Aragorn by only the vague directions Legolas had been able to give him, when the faint but unmistakeable sweetness of pipe smoke entered his nose. Following the scent, he soon stepped out between the trees into a small clearing. The moonlight was bright enough here to see quite well, and smoke was rising up from a pipe where Aragorn was sitting on the ground, his coat fanned out under him, his back leaning against the trunk of an old oak tree, seemingly startled out of his thoughts by Boromir’s arrival.

“I do not wish to force my company upon you,” Boromir said, looking at the shadows that played over Aragorn’s face, his blue eyes scarcely shimmering through, the tip of his pipe at his lips. “But I must tell you something of utmost importance. You…” He stopped, forcing the words over his lips, feeling their sting as they left his mouth. “You are right not to trust me. The Ring…I fear it has taken my senses. Since Lothlorien I have not spent a single night not dreaming of it, not a single morning not wishing it were in my hand. There is greed and anger inside me now, and hardly anything close to honour, or goodness. The way I spoke to you earlier – Aragorn, I am no longer myself. I cannot recognise…”

Something was clogging Boromir’s throat, preventing him from speaking further, and Aragorn put his pipe aside and rose to his feet, stepping towards him. Boromir was reminded of Lothlorien, when he had opened his heart to Aragorn for the first time, when Aragorn had halted his nightly routines and sat down next to him on the root of the tree, listening to him and comforting him with his presence. That had been the first night Boromir had seen him as King, but he hadn’t been able to tell him then, the realisation still too crisp and new in his mind.

Aragorn’s hands at the sides of his face surprised him, but the touch anchored him, too, somehow, kept him from getting swept up in his despair, and his own hands came up to cling to Aragorn’s shoulders like those of a man drowning, the human warmth through the tunic a soothing presence beneath his fingers.

Tears were pricking at the corners of his eyes.

In the presence of any other Boromir would have felt humiliated by this sudden state of vulnerability, would have turned away and sought solitude to regain his composure, but he yearned for the closeness Aragorn was granting him now, the deep warmth in his eyes.

“You are wrong, Son of Gondor. Honour, goodness and love, all of these things – you possess them, still. But the Ring is turning them against you. It corrupts everything that’s good in us, until we fall under its spell. I have felt it, too. Felt it calling to me, beckoning me to take it, to use it to protect Middle Earth and those I love. But that is what it wants. That is what Sauron wants. We cannot wield it. If we try, it will destroy us.”

Boromir felt tears spilling over his cheeks now, and he couldn’t hold Aragorn’s gaze any longer, lowering his eyes to the ground. “You are stronger than I am, Aragorn.”

Aragorn was stroking hair back from Boromir’s face now, the roughness of his fingers balanced by the softness of the gesture, and Boromir was shocked by how much he craved Aragorn’s touch.

“I am not carrying the same burden as you,” Aragorn said, quietly.

A sob wrenched itself from Boromir’s throat, and Aragorn pulled him in, his body warm and unyielding as Boromir’s head sank into the side of his neck, the scent of grass, wood and pipeweed in his nose, Aragorn’s hand in his hair, his own arms clinging to Aragorn’s tunic.

Some part of him wished he could stay here forever, so surrounded by Aragorn’s presence, but shame was creeping up inside him unannounced, and he disengaged himself from Aragorn’s embrace, his cheeks flushed. Aragorn let go of him with hesitation, and Boromir ignored the feeling of loss. He took some time to collect himself, before he spoke again, succeeding to meet Aragorn’s eyes this time.

“I will leave at the break of dawn and go south towards Minas Tirith. Alone. Tell my father that the Ring is out of his reach and build Gondor’s defences up for the coming war. I do not wish to leave the Fellowship, but I cannot trust myself around the Ring, and I will not risk causing harm to any of you. There might be no honour in running away, but -“

Aragorn interrupted him, lifting his hand to touch Boromir’s shoulder, his eyes full of sincerity and softness.

“You would fail your father to keep us all safe, Boromir. You would forsake the Ring. We wouldn’t have to undertake this journey, had Isildur had that kind of honour.”

The mention of Isildur sent a shiver down Boromir’s back, and he surveyed Aragorn’s face, the sharpness of his nose, the handsome symmetry of his features, the gleaming blue of his eyes – a face that, under all the grime and dirt from their journey, was more than becoming of a King.

“I’ve long dreamed of bringing the Ring to Minas Tirith,” he admitted, quietly. “But when first it was my father that wielded it for Gondor, all I could see in my dreams after Lothlorien was you. As King. The Ring around your neck, giving you power you would wisely use to protect our people. Half of those dreams were the whispers of the Ring, poisoning my thoughts, yes…but the other half.”

Boromir held Aragorn’s gaze. And then, overcome by a sudden surge of emotion, he dropped to one knee on the ground. He could almost feel Aragorn tensing up above him in surprise, but his eyes were still fixed to Boromir’s, and he didn’t utter a word; and so, uninterrupted, Boromir kept speaking.

“Gondor doesn’t need the Ring. But Gondor needs _you_ , Aragorn. Without you there is no hope for our country, our people. You lead with wisdom, with grace, with love. And I would have followed you.” Boromir could feel tears creeping back into his eyes, but this time he managed to blink them away, though he couldn’t keep the small breaking out of his voice, betraying its firmness. “My King.”

To Boromir’s complete surprise, Aragorn sank to his knees right before him – and Boromir didn’t know if the moon was playing tricks on his mind, but he thought he saw wetness in Aragorn’s eyes. His hand came up to Boromir’s cheek once again, and Boromir found himself transfixed by the sudden closeness of his face, the warm breath hitting his lips.

“You would have me as your King?” Aragorn asked, no more than a rough whisper on his lips.

“I would.” Boromir spoke the words into the diminishing space between them like a prayer. He couldn’t help himself, yearning as he was for Aragorn’s warmth, and touched his fingers to the man’s temple, ever so slightly trembling. “Will you forgive me my weakness?”

Aragorn’s head sank forward, his forehead bracing itself against Boromir’s, one hand still at the side of his face, the other at his shoulder, and something wild and beautiful was springing to life in Boromir’s stomach, something so different to the joyless swell of greed for the One Ring he had gotten used to.

Aragorn lifted his head again to look at him.

“You have done nothing you would need to ask my forgiveness for, Boromir,” he said. “But if it is what you desire, you shall have it.” Aragorn’s thumb was stroking over Boromir’s eyebrow, his jaw, tracing the features of his face, and Boromir shuddered under the intensity of his attention.

“Is there nothing else that you desire from me but this?” Aragorn’s words were soft-spoken, but they kindled a spark of heat in Boromir’s stomach all the same.

“It would be immoderate to-,” he gave back, stopping in the middle of his sentence. These waters were precarious: Aragorn’s touch, his warmth, the look in his eyes, were already hitting too close, bringing something inside him to boil that Boromir didn’t have the strength to quell. And yet, the heat rising in Boromir’s stomach seemed to be reflected in Aragorn’s eyes as well, and if Aragorn’s carefully posed question expressed what Boromir thought it to be expressing...

He took a deep breath before speaking again, and his words were quiet and low when he did. “What I desire from you is too great. I can never demand it.”

“It would not be a demand,” Aragorn retorted, his eyes not leaving Boromir’s. “It would be a gift.”

And Boromir yielded, yielded to Aragorn’s soft words, to his warm presence, to the heat in his eyes, brought his mouth to Aragorn’s and crashed their lips together. He was answered by a tightening of Aragorn’s grip on his shoulder, fingers tangling in his hair to draw him closer and the slick softness of Aragorn’s mouth, opening up against him – and Boromir fell into him helplessly, his head and heart filled completely by Aragorn’s presence, as though nothing existed outside of him.

“When did my affections become so obvious to you?” Boromir asked, when he came up for air, letting his eyes fall to Aragorn’s lips, aching to put more kisses there.

Aragorn smiled. “Around the time we pulled a Cave Troll off Samwise Gamgee at Moria.”

Something regretful rose inside Boromir when he realised that this was all they would get for a long time – maybe ever. None of their journeys was a safe one _._

“Why didn’t you kiss me in Moria then? Why didn’t you kiss me in Lorien?” he demanded, and Aragorn pulled him closer, a pacifying hand at the nape of his neck.

“I wanted to,” he said, warmly. “But I feared you might hit me.”

Boromir chuckled, despite himself, and shook his head. “I might have.” His expression turned serious again, as he looked at Aragorn. “But I would have kissed you back, afterwards.”

He invaded Aragorn’s space again, kissing him deeper this time, and imagined what it would have been like to do this sooner, in Moria, with the heat of battle still coursing through their veins, or in Lothlorien, the sounds of water and Elven song surrounding them.

_We wasted so much time._

Soon the kisses between them grew painfully arousing, and Aragorn dragged them into the shadow of the trees to where his coat still lay on the ground. There was some fumbling in the dark, since the moonlight hardly sufficed to illuminate all the ties that held their clothing together, and their patience hardly sufficed to get them open; but after some frustration they had finally shed their tunics, belts and breeches and Boromir marvelled at Aragorn’s naked form in the moonlight. His body was strong, hard, tan and lean, not as bulky as Boromir’s own, marked by scars that spoke of numerous encounters with swords and arrows. It was a body Boromir could imagine spending many, many days and nights worshipping.

“You are glorious, Aragorn,” he whispered, and a soft moan slipped from Aragorn’s mouth as he pulled Boromir in for another kiss. Boromir kissed back, nipping at Aragorn’s lip, before he let his mouth wander down over the vast expanses of skin he had been so kindly offered. He would have taken his time to explore, had he not been driven so entirely by need, but there was little to be done about his impatience, and Aragorn didn’t seem to mind when Boromir’s hands and lips closed around his length with only little delay. His fingers were in Boromir’s hair, not quite tugging, but when Boromir twisted his tongue around him, he tensed and let out a small cry of pleasure. Smiling, Boromir went deeper, one hand grabbing on to Aragorn’s hips for stability as he nosed into the hair at the base of him. Aragorn’s familiar scent was heavier and muskier here, intensified by his arousal. More appreciative sounds made their way out of Aragorn’s mouth, interspersed with something that sounded a lot like Sindarin, and Boromir could feel his own body reacting to the pleasure he was so obviously giving him, aching for its own release. But Boromir was diligent in his task, and he would not distract from it by touching himself now – there was plenty of time for that later. His first and foremost goal now was to bring Aragorn over the edge; and by the trembling of the man’s thighs and the quickness of his breathing he could tell that he was close to succeeding.

“Boromir…Boromir – I cannot – _Eru Ilúvatar –_ I will not last…” Aragorn said, urgency in his voice, and Boromir raised his head. Aragorn’s hair was unruly around his head, his eyes almost black in the moonlight, his features completely taken over by pleasure, the muscles in his arms straining between the attempt to sit up and the need to lie down.

He was breathtaking.

Boromir touched Aragorn’s hand that had been clinging tightly to the coat it was placed on, opening his fingers and tangling them with his own.

“There is no need to last. Let me have your pleasure,” Boromir returned, his voice hoarse from what he had been doing. Aragorn looked at him with a gentleness that almost caused Boromir physical pain; and then, he nodded. Having been given permission, Boromir took him in his mouth again, deep and fast, his hand closing and twisting around the length he could not swallow. Moments later Aragorn’s fingers in his hair tightened, and he finished with a low cry down Boromir’s throat.

There was peace for a few moments.

Boromir spread small, calming kisses over the place where Aragorn’s thighs joined his hips, relishing the bitter taste at his palate, testament to the pleasure he had just given to the man who would be his King. He was pulled away with gentle force only shortly after, upwards, into Aragorn’s arms, Aragorn’s mouth hot and insistent against his own, kissing the taste of himself away.

“A greater gift than I could have imagined, _melindo_ ,” Aragorn murmured against his lips, the words warm and full of awe; and Boromir buried his hands in Aragorn’s hair to kiss him deeper.

The kiss was interrupted when a shift in Aragorn’s thighs brought them up against Boromir’s hardened length, the friction sending a debilitating strike of pleasure up his spine, and a groan wrested itself from his throat.

“A gift I wish to return,” Aragorn said, and Boromir could hear the smile in his voice. With shocking ease, Aragorn flipped them over, and Boromir was treated to his strong, heated body pressing into him from above, blue eyes smiling down at him through the moonlight. Something about this position, about being so bracketed by Aragorn’s form, protected, held and shielded, sent a surge of warm reverence through Boromir’s body.

“My King,” he said, softly, and in saying it, he found himself almost shocked at the thought that this was _happening_. That despite everything, he was allowed to see, to have Aragorn like this. Even just for now.

Aragorn’s fingers stroked his cheek. “I have shunned this title for so long. But when you say it, it does not bother me so. When you say it, it almost sounds like _my love_ to my ears.”

Boromir shuddered, his hand grasping for the warm stability of Aragorn’s shoulder, his voice full of emotion when he raised it again.

“Come to the White City, Aragorn. When it is all done, come and be what you are meant to be.”

Aragorn smiled, something wistful in his eyes now.

“Will you wait for me?”

“Until the end,” Boromir said, his eyes fixed to Aragorn’s. “Until the very end.”

The next kiss he pressed to Aragorn’s lips was almost brutal, but Boromir wanted – _needed –_ him to understand, to remember this as something that would always hold true. Aragorn responded to the onslaught with a soft confidence, not yielding to it, but not demanding more, either; and then he bowed his head and placed a series of kisses down the hollow of Boromir’s throat, his tongue hot and clever, his hands roaming, claiming every inch of skin they could find. He was more patient than Boromir had been before, teasing him with kisses and touches for what seemed like an eternity, and Boromir felt close to begging, when Aragorn’s mouth finally wrapped around his length, brilliant heat and wetness. He knew that this was going to be over too soon; there was no way he would be able to contain himself for long, not with Aragorn’s mouth and hands on him like this, his dark hair reflecting moonlight, his eyes closed, a soft humming sound in his throat while he gave Boromir what he needed, as if it were perfectly ordinary for a King to do this for his liegeman. Boromir wanted to warn his lover, when he felt his peak nearing, but putting a hand on Aragorn’s shoulder to signify that he was close to the edge only seemed to prompt the man to go deeper, the tip of his tongue sweeping over the sensitive spot at the underside of Boromir’s sex more insistently. Moments later Boromir succumbed to the powerful wave of pleasure bursting through his bones and muscles, let it spill out of him in a barely-stifled moan.

A low sound of approval fell from Aragorn’s lips as he let go of Boromir. He came back up and Boromir pulled him against his side, sated and spent, but still not tired enough to keep from kissing him, his cheeks, his mouth, his neck.

Aragorn laughed when Boromir pulled him in tighter for better access to the latter, and his lips brushed Boromir’s hairline.

“Next time, when we are both less spent and more patient, I would have you take me, Boromir.”

Boromir felt heat coiling in his stomach at these words, accompanied by a considerable amount of shock that must have come through in his expression, when he broke away from Aragorn to look at him.

Aragorn looked back with warmth in his eyes. “I have demanded too much. I apologise.”

Boromir shook his head, his breath catching in his throat, the heat in his stomach expanding outward. “You have not. You surprised me, that is all. I did not expect this offer from a King to his Steward.”

“What about from a man to his lover?” Aragorn inquired.

Boromir breathed deeply, his emotions threatening to overwhelm him again. But he nodded, nonetheless. “It would be my honour to have you, Aragorn.”

“Good,” Aragorn said, placing a hand at the back of Boromir’s head and pulling him in, the blue of his eyes deep and clear, mixed with a lovely smattering of mischief. “I shall hold you to your honour, Boromir of Gondor.”

***

As much as Boromir might have wished it, they couldn’t stay in the clearing indefinitely. Dawn was approaching quickly, colouring the sky grey in the east, and a sense of heaviness settled over them as they put their clothes on in silence. Boromir felt like he was stepping out of a beautiful dream when they finally made their way back through the forest towards the camp, like the events of the night had happened to some other version of himself in some other world than this.

Before they reached the last line of trees behind the camp, however, Aragorn stopped Boromir in his tracks with a hand on his arm. When Boromir turned, Aragorn took his face between his hands and pressed a long, lingering kiss to his lips.

 _My parting gift,_ Boromir thought, when Aragorn let go of him, and it was almost too much to look at him for a moment. No words came to Boromir, none poignant or meaningful enough to do this moment justice, so he held his peace. But then – he had already said all the things that truly mattered in the night.

They passed the last line of trees, then, leaving the shadow of the forest and stepping into the washed-out blue of dawn. Legolas was still sitting watch, at the embers of the fire, nodding at Aragorn when he spotted them. The hobbits and the dwarf were still sound asleep, and it was better this way, Boromir conceded, picking up his shield, sword, horn and other belongings. Apart from Frodo, they would not understand why he was leaving.

The Ringbearer.

Boromir’s eyes fell on the dark shock of Frodo’s hair that was peeking out of his bedroll, and there it was again: The thrall, the beckoning Siren song of the Ring.

_Why leave? Why fail your father? Why sacrifice so much, when you have the power to change Gondor’s fate? Do you really think the man who would be your King can change the course of destiny? He is human, like you. His life is so frail, so easily taken. Take me, and the world of men will no longer hang in the balance. Take me, and you won’t need him._

“No,” Boromir murmured. “I have faith in him.”

Before the Ring could continue its whispers, Boromir had turned away from it. He walked over to where Legolas had gotten up from his sitting position. His hands touched Boromir’s shoulders, and when their eyes met, Boromir knew that Legolas had long perceived his intentions.

“May the stars guide you home safely, Son of Gondor. And may we fight again at each other’s side.”

“Farewell, Legolas. Tell the little ones-“ Boromir hadn’t been quite prepared for the lump in his throat that formed at these words, but he struggled to the end of his sentence regardless. “-tell them to keep practising their swordplay. There will always be an open door in Gondor for them. As there is for you, and for Gimli.”

Legolas smiled, letting go of him, and Boromir moved past him to the edge of the forest, hesitating as he regarded the looming shadows of the trees.

 _How disappointed my father will be,_ he thought.

The thought didn’t sting as much as it once had, and it left him altogether when Aragorn’s hand landed on his shoulder, a strong, physical reminder why Boromir was doing this.

“Do not linger at the river too long,” Aragorn said, his voice warm at Boromir’s ear. “The Eastern bank is not safe. And as of late, I do not have a very good feeling about the Western bank, either. Find a horse and take the route through the Eastfold. Rohan should be the safest path.”

Boromir turned to him, a smile playing on his lips. “I have travelled for a hundred days from Minas Tirith to Rivendell along secret paths through orc-infested lands,” he said. “I will find my way home.” His smile faded a little. “It is you who must take care. Your journey is far more dangerous than mine.”

Aragorn nodded, his fingers gripping Boromir’s shoulder so tightly it almost hurt. “I promise you, I will. And we will find each other again. In happier circumstances.”

Boromir looked at him, the blue of his eyes, the determined set of his jaw, and found that – without a shadow of a doubt – he believed him.

“I will hold you to this promise,” Boromir gave back. “My King.” These last words were hardly a whisper on his lips, but the look of longing in Aragorn’s eyes told him they had been understood in all their meaning.

He let go of Boromir’s shoulder, and Boromir turned away, took the ache in his heart with him, his eyes on the ground as he stepped into the forest. He set off into south-western direction, not looking back, not daring to dwell on his feelings too long, focusing instead on the crunch of the leaves beneath his feet and the scent of the trees around him.

After less than an hour of walking the forest receded, and Boromir was greeted by the hills of East Emnet in the distance. To his left lay the river Entwash, the Eastfold, and, further south, over the mountains: Gondor.

Boromir couldn’t help but listen, one last time, for the call of the One Ring. It was too far away to hear now, and his heart grew lighter.

As the sun rose behind him, dipping the landscape in gold, a sense of overwhelming relief befell Boromir. The ache in his heart was still there, the pain of an uncertain future, the worry for the fate of his people, the fear of his father’s wrath. But there was also something else, unfurling its wings inside of him, slowly, until it filled his chest entirely, reflecting the morning light in brilliant colours.

For the first time in a long time, Boromir, Son of Denethor, had hope.


End file.
